Freedom House rates Armenia, Karabakh as ‘partly free’

January 25, 2014 - 18:53 AMT

PanARMENIAN.Net - The state of freedom declined for the eighth consecutive year in 2013, according to Freedom in the World 2014, Freedom House’s annual country-by-country report on global political rights and civil liberties.

Particularly notable were developments in Egypt, which endured across-the-board reversals in its democratic institutions following a military coup. There were also serious setbacks to democratic rights in other large, politically influential countries, including Russia, Ukraine, Azerbaijan, Turkey, Venezuela, and Indonesia.

Armenia and Nagorno Karabakh climbed from 6 to 5 to have ‘partly free’ rating.

Azerbaijan’s civil liberties rating declined to ‘not free’ from 5 to 6 due to ongoing, blatant property rights violations by the government in a year in which the state also cracked down on the opposition and civil society in advance of presidential elections.

Georgia and Moldova, which boast Eurasia’s best rankings on the Freedom in the World scale, did initial their EU agreements despite concerted Russian pressure. In Georgia, a presidential election that was widely regarded as fair and honest marked a further step toward the consolidation of democracy, the report said.